


Immaculate

by bullet (teii)



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, M/M, discussions about death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-28
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:21:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21594478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teii/pseuds/bullet
Summary: And every so often, Newt’s record player plays La Vie En Rose on its own (or Newton’s) volition, which always leads to Hermann looking over to find Newt fluttering his eyelashes at him as he cradles his chin on his hands.“Newt, please show even the slightest bit of decorum, would you?” Hermann would say, attempting to look cross, but the smile Newt sends his way is aggressively unrepentant as he mouths along with the words.--Ghosts!AU
Relationships: Newton Geiszler/Hermann Gottlieb
Comments: 8
Kudos: 61





	Immaculate

**Author's Note:**

> HELLOMST. Big big thank you to both [k-sci-janitor](https://k-sci-janitor.tumblr.com/) and [hermannsthumb](https://hermannsthumb.tumblr.com/) for being very nice and letting me use their [cute ghost AU](https://k-sci-janitor.tumblr.com/post/188829094620/hermannsthumb-and-i-were-talking-about-a-ghost-au). :) I wrote three versions of this story, scrapping and then restarting until I kept this one. It was...a vulnerable and prickly piece for me to write ahah. I hope you enjoy. :)

1979

The first thing Newt sees when he wakes, is him.

He’s sitting there, on a properly posh Victorian-era chaise lounge, book in hand. Newt stares at him for awhile, getting his bearings, blinking slow, trying to remember anything beforehand.

He comes up with nothing, and the man eventually looks over, a cautious smile on his face, as if concerned, but not surprised that a man has suddenly showed up in his midst.

“Hello.”

Newton opens his mouth, a question and a greeting both trying to escape, but he can’t form the words.

Newt flounders for a moment, as the man patiently watches him, then decides to point at him.

“Me?”

Newt nods.

“Gottlieb. Hermann Gottlieb. Do you...remember who you were?”

Newt shrugs, flipping his hand in uncertainty, and Hermann nods understandably. “I had the same problem when I first woke. Give it time.”

Newt nods, focusing instead on the room, the giant bay windows on one end, to the plush carpet and giant Ming vases at each of the corners of the room. The wall to the left of the windows is filled with books, surrounding a cozy fireplace crackling away. On the opposite side is what looks to be a dining room, the tables and chairs intricate and detailed, though seemingly worn from age.

In between the two, is the chaise lounge, and the table, and the record player.

The man politely returns to his reading, giving Newt time to recollect. Asking any questions now would be futile.

Newton closes his eyes, sitting on the opposite end of the chaise lounge next to the record player, and waits.

\--

It takes a week, or so, before the details start trickling in. Small ones, insignificant ones at first. The way coffee tastes, the shape of a toothbrush, the anatomy of the brain, then memories of defending his thesis, then defending another one, and another. He starts seeing people, places, experiences, and then--

Hermann watches as the man points to himself, then writes on the floor with a finger: "N-E-W-T".

"Newt?" Hermann reads out loud, frowning. Was that a typical name nowadays?

The man grins at him, as if biting back a secret, nodding vigorously.

They go back and forth like that, the two of them asking and answering questions, but it becomes clear that Newton’s handwriting was less than stellar, his hand looping, zigzagging and slashing across the floor and Hermann finally shakes his head at last, unable to make heads or tails of it.

“I apologize, but I--”

Newt’s hands goes into a flurry, waving his hands and shaking his head, and bites his bottom lip, eyebrows furrowed in concentration. Not long after, he snaps his fingers, an idea brewing in his head.

He presses a finger against the floor again, but this time, making an exaggeratedly gigantic ‘A’ before looking up and holding up his right hand in a loose fist, using his left to point in between his right hand and the floor.

Hermann nods, waiting, and Newt then draws a similarly large ‘B’, before holding up his hand palm facing Hermann, then tucking his thumb against the middle of his palm.

_Ah._

Hermann mirrors him. “B. This is B?”

Newt’s eyes light up, as he nodded excitedly, before diving back into the lesson. They go through it once more, with Hermann successfully running through the entire alphabet without hesitation, and Newton claps enthusiastically, pumping his fist in the air.

**_S-O-R-R-Y, AMERICAN SIGN LANUAGE_ ** _,_ Newt signs out, a rueful smile on his face, **_DIN'T LEARN BRIT SL._ **

**_NOT VRY GOOD AT IT EITHR_ **, Newt fumbles out apologetically, and Hermann shakes his head.

"I'm delighted just to have someone to converse with, after so long," Hermann confesses, and Newt brightens up, hands in a flurry once more.

\--

It didn't take long before Newt gains confidence in his signing, his hands a blur as he tries to make his hand keep up with his brain, and he and Hermann have naturally began to a few shorthand common phrases.

**_WHAT DO U DO TYPICALLY?_ **

Hermann fans a hand out behind him, at the floor-to-ceiling wall of books. “Read. Not to say I haven’t read all of the books on the shelves numerous times, but I do have ones I’m happy enough to return to.”

Hermann looks towards the windows. “Other times, I keep the lady of the house company.”

**_Oh rly?_ ** Newt signs, unable to keep the smile off his face in favor of keeping the innuendo to himself.

“Yes, the lady of the house.” Hermann nods, not seeing the humor in the statement. “She has been quite kind to me over the years.”

Newton frowns at this.

**_Kind? She knows u’re here?_ **  
  


“In a manner of speaking.” Hermann sniffs, “At the very least, she shares her tea with me.”

Newt pantomimes holding a cup in his hands and lifting them up to his mouth, complete with a raised eyebrow.

“In a matter of speaking,” Hermann repeats, slotting his hands together formally across his lap.

\--

They begin to measure the days and months by the flowers blooming outside. There's primroses in early spring, then lavenders moving onto hydrangeas in the late spring showers and early summer months, rounding out with larkspurs before the frost sets in. 

The lady of the house turns out to be a septuagenarian in good health but with little family. If not out and about in town, she’s lounging in the drawing room on Hermann’s chaise lounge or the seat by the windows, or she has her sewing circle come by and they all retreat to the dining room where there’s more room for them and their supplies. 

"Jasmine," Hermann announces when the lady of the house has settled into the drawing room for a late afternoon tea, and waits until she’s finished with pouring the tea both into hers and the unused china cup, then reaching down to pick up the second cup's essence, leaving its physical form intact, and extending it out to Newt.

**_N u?_ **

“Aren’t we sharing?”

**_Not shy abt swapping spit?_ **

Hermann huffs, the concept of ghost saliva utterly inane to him, then pulls the cup back, purposefully drinking the whole thing in one shot.

**_Can u taste it?_ **

Hermann pauses, staring into the cup.

“Barely. Shortly after I expired, I could enjoy it, now it’s little more than a ritual.”

Newton looks away for a moment, but with resolve, gently takes the teacup and saucer from Hermann, pours himself a bit, and takes a sip. Slightly floral, soothing in the back of his throat.

**_It’s good._ **

Hermann takes the olive branch, the prickly feeling of loss dying down. “I’m pleased to hear it.”

\--

Newt's taken to the habit of hovering over Hermann as he reads. Hermann had put up a token protest, before realizing it was that or Newton being always just out of his periphery, roaming about the room aimlessly was far more distracting.

So he reads out loud, as Newton lies on his left side so as to keep his right hand free to sign, occasionally butting in remark on a certain passage or react to a character’s actions.

And every so often, Newt’s record player plays Edith Piaf’s _La Vie En Rose_ on its own (or Newton’s) volition, which always leads to Hermann looking over to find Newt fluttering his eyelashes at him as he cradles his chin on his hands.

“Newt, please show even the slightest bit of decorum, would you?” Hermann would say, attempting to look cross, but the smile Newt sends his way is aggressively unrepentant as he mouths along with the words.

\--

And then, there are days in the garden. Hermann can extend farther out to see the duck pond out back, but Newton can’t quite reach as far. Even so, he mingles about stone walkway leading up to the porch, and picks a few delicate translucent essences of periwinkles and anemones, then patiently waits for Hermann to return from his walk so he can tuck one or two behind Hermann’s ear. Hermann huffs, stoic as ever, but makes no attempt to brush them off, as he points out the first hyacinths of the season.

The three of them sit on the porch, as the woman all but sings love poems from a book. Hermann glances a look over at Newton, fiddling with the remaining flowers in his hands, and tempers the feeling to brush one against his cheek.

1988

  
  


It felt inevitable.

Hermann’s reading through the Odyssey again, and Newton is content to simply watch the late afternoon sun drift onto Hermann’s translucent form, and seeing the light refract, just a little, off his hair and fingers and--.

“Newt?” Hermann calls out to him, smiling.

Newt takes a moment to sear the image in his mind. Of Hermann’s face, soft and free of that stern look he often has, of his hand extending out to him. Newt crosses the room and pauses only to wait for approval, before leaning down and claiming Hermann’s lips with his.

Slow. Soft. Fragile.

They pull back after a spell, and Newt laughs a little.

“Oh. _Wow_ ,” Newton sighs. His eyes light up as soon as the words tumble out of him.

“Oh my god, Hermann, what just-- am I--” Newton laughs, trembling with excitement.

Hermann lights up in kind, and opens his mouth, but closes it shortly. He simply touches his own throat, then attempts a feeble smile.

“Oh,” Newton lets out. Before the panic sets in for real: “Oh no. Oh no, no, no.” Newton shakes his head, as if it could dispel the nightmare, and he takes Hermann’s hands into his: “I didn’t do this to you, right? It must have-- I must have…”

**_It is not your fault._** Hermann signs, for the first time in years.

“It is, it so is, it definitely is,” Newton argues.

**_Newt, it is not your fault._ **

Newt gives him a weak glare that crumbles immediately, and he has to look away, letting go of Hermann’s hand.

\--

They circle each other for weeks. Hermann holding his hands out, occasionally signing something, but mostly has them open, palm up, asking for Newt to hold them again. And every now and again, Newt stares at him, then surges forward to claim Hermann’s lips, pressing hard, staining the act with guilt and grief and desperation, so much that Hermann feels as if he could drown in Newt’s misery. As if Newt only tried hard enough, he could pour his whole soul straight into Hermann. Hermann pushes at Newton’s chest, and tilts Newton’s face up to look at him directly as he signs out:

**_If you are going to kiss me, please kiss me with love._ **

“I stole your voice, I’m trying to give it back,” Newt bites, anger masking his helplessness. “I’m trying to _fix this_.”

**_You didn’t take anything I wouldn’t have readily given to you._ ** Hermann signs, then after a moment, **_Heart included._ **

Hermann floats over, then places a hand on Newt’s record player, and watches solemnly as it obeys his commands, and the familiar refrains of _La Vie En Rose_ start up, only now, the chauntese’s voice is pitched deeper into a rich tenor, and Hermann looks over at Newt, his eyes hard-set and determined.

**_I will not take back my feelings. I do not feel any different, and you have done me no wrong_ **, he signs out, slow and purposeful. There is no rush, after all, and he wants Newt to see exactly what he’s saying.

But Newton shakes his head, still unwilling to accept Hermann’s absolution.

**_So tell me about yourself. I’ve talked about myself for long enough._ **

Newt looks over at him, then down at his own hands, and he starts slow, as if still feeling guilty of having a voice, of having _Hermann’s_ voice, and he tells him of growing up in San Francisco, of his mother and father and his three sisters, and summers in Oregon, and of Stanford, then Oxford, then that terrible party and The Fall and then--

“Here I am. I guess.” Newton ends with a grimace, hours later. 

Hermann is undeterred. **_By the grace of God._ **

“No, no.” Newton shakes his head.

 **_  
_ ** **_A gift, to me._ **

“Don’t.” Newton begs, gripping onto Hermann’s arm. “Please, don’t.”

They’ve reached an impasse, but at least Newton doesn’t protest when Hermann presses his forehead with his. 

They don’t speak for the rest of the day.

\--

“How are you holding up?”

**_Tired_ **, Hermann admits, his hands shaking as he forms the letters, and Newt makes a face. Ghosts don't get tired. Ghosts don't need sleep, and yet Hermann can barely keep his eyes open lately.

It’s New Years Eve, and the lady of the house is fast asleep on the bay window seat with the television on in the background.

Newt takes Hermann’s hands in his, squeezing tightly. "If you need to, you can go. I'll be right behind you, I swear."

Hermann relaxes at that statement, blearily looking up at Newt and barely registering the countdown taking place on the television, heralding in 1989.

The last thing Hermann experiences is the feel of lips on his forehead, and Newt brokenly stumbling his way through _La Vie En Rose_ , his voice breathy and high with the threat of tears.

“ _Quand, il me prend dans ses bras, Il me parle l'a tout bas...._ ”

Hermann smiles, he only wishes he had asked Newt to sing to him much sooner.

  
  


2017

The first thing Hermann sees when he walks into the lab that day, is him.

Hermann can barely hear Pentecost’s introduction, too transfixed by the man now standing before him, just as shocked.

He’s seen his face a hundred times in his dreams, when he’s awake, whenever he closes his eyes, the image burned onto his eyelids, but he’s never had a name to go with the face.

But seeing him here, in front of him, everything slots into place. 

“...I suppose I’ll leave you two gentlemen to get acquainted,” Pentecost finishes up, before nodding sharply to the newcomer. “I expect great things from you, Dr. Gieszler.”

Geizsler nods, in a daze as he stares at Hermann, and Hermann swallows thickly, not knowing what to do, now that the man of his literal dreams is standing right in front of him.

But he doesn’t have to do much, as barely a second after Pentecost steps out of the lab that Gieszler, no-- _Newt_ tackles him, squeezing him until Hermann whaps at his shoulder, hissing. “Newt, please, my leg--”

Newt’s eyes widen in alarm, as he pinwheels back, horrified. “Oh god, oh shit, dude, I’m so sorry, wait--” Newt fumbles at Hermann’s hands, stunned. “You can talk.”

“Well yes, I--”

Newt’s shaking Hermann’s hand up and down, trying not to go in for another bruising hug, and instead is bouncing up and down like a child. “Dude, this is crazy, this is so-- I can’t believe--I'm just--”

Hermann silences him with a kiss, before using his thumb to brush away a stray tear along Newton’s cheek.

“Let's start from the beginning.”

\--

They both couldn’t even entertain the idea of starting work for the day, and find themselves in Hermann’s quarters not fifteen minutes later, slotted together on Hermann's bed, loosely holding hands, swapping little details about this life.

Hermann sighs. They both know everything and nothing about each other, and its core, it’s an unsettling feeling, being so absolutely in love with what was practically a complete stranger.

And Newt can't stop talking. “I’ve had so many dreams of you, past you I guess, but-- yeah. Most of them was just you sitting on that sofa, reading, and I’d just...watch you for hours like that in my dream even though you barely moved, like watching a photograph or something, like some weirdo, but then sometimes, you’d look up, call my name and smile at me? And it was-- it was just--” Newton takes a breath, almost wincing.

“It hurt. Like, I don’t know why it hurt every time you-- or he did that. But I just wanted more.”

Newton stills, blinking up towards the ceiling. “I don’t remember why it hurt.”

Hermann remembers the feeling of his throat constricting, and voicing out soundless words, and decides not to bring it up. There was no need for that in this life.

Newt rambles on, “Y’know, before today, I figured that like-- when a person dies, and if the body is left to its devices it’ll will decompose naturally, right? I thought that the soul will decompose as well, and scatter, and eventually the fragments will mesh with other soul fragments from elsewhere to create a completely new soul. A remix of sorts.” Newton smiles. Staring in the face of death so regularly tends to make PPDC employees all that much more candid about the subject. “There is no hell, and there is no heaven, because how can you judge a soul that’s been erased?”

Newt tilts his head up, reaching up to touch Hermann’s face, “But, here you are. Whole. Intact. _Immaculate_.”

“Just as much as you are.” Hermann murmurs as he encloses his hand over Newt's. “Just as much as you have been. Just as much as you ever were.”

“Grammar failing you?” Newton teases lightly, “Or maybe my theory is pure bullshit,” Newton laughs. “But it’s the only one that really lets me go back to sleep, when I’m getting all those existential crises at 3 am.”

They stay like this, breathing together, nothing more. Sharing the space of Hermann’s tiny bed, with Newton half on top of him lying on his side, right hand still free, as if out of habit.

And he confesses: “I’m glad I finally found you. Even at the end of the world. Even if only because the world is ending. But I’m not afraid of that scenario, and that might be selfish of me, to not be afraid of death in this way when there’s so many people gone. But I believe that-- I will find you again, after all this, no matter what happens. Whole and Immaculate. The human race may die off, maybe the next time we meet we won’t be humans anymore.” Newton takes his hand away, thoughtful, “Is that too hopeful? Or the complete opposite?"

"It could be both." Hermann hums, pressing a kiss into Newton's hair.

2018

Hermann wakes to find Newton already out of bed and hunched over his laptop. A rare sight, given that Hermann is usually out of bed before six.

“I was thinking, and I kind of feel crazy for even thinking about it but--” Newton says, as if starting halfway through a sentence he had been mumbling to himself over and over.

“What?”

Newton doesn’t respond, until: “ _Dude_.” He turns the screen towards Hermann, stabbing a finger at a picture of an old English country house with a sprawling garden out front.

Hermann’s eyes widen. “Do you think?”

“Maybe.” Newt says, taking out a pen from the desk drawer and scribbling down a phone number. “Just maybe.”

\--

Newt’s bouncing on his feet, excited, the Very Important Shipment is arriving today, and he’s barely slept a wink, which meant Hermann didn’t sleep either, and was now grousing beside him. He grips the lukewarm styrofoam cup of coffee tighter and blearily blinks as he tries not to fall asleep standing up, yawning widely.

“Please, do not jostle me, Gieszler,” Hermann clips, but Newt’s undeterred, waving his hands as he spies a figure off in the distance.

“Mako!!”

He bows exaggeratedly at her, to which she giggles and curtsies in return, and places her small hand in his. He raises it up over her hand and gently holds it as she spins twice in a circle. “Lovely morning we’re having, Lady Mori,”

“Quite, Sir Geiszler,” they managed to say, before both dissolving into giggles. “Hey kiddo, something super cool’s coming in today, wanna stick around and see?”

Mako’s eyes widen, before she shrinks a bit, remembering her schedule. “I have Russian lessons in a little bit,” she admits, though looking longingly at the loading bay.

“That’s ok, swing by when you have the time.” 

Her Russian lessons with the Kaidovskys then morphed into a Russian History lesson, and after another few hours, she finally leaves their quarters, and she takes a detour down to the K-science labs, eager to see the new kaiju specimen, but when she enters, there didn’t seem to be anything new on Newt’s side. Instead, the only new installments were a curiously ornate looking chaise lounge, clashing with the grim steel and no-nonsense apparatus surrounding them, and a cherry oak table with a record player gently crooning out bossa nova.

On the chaise lounge, there’s Dr. Gottlieb,dozing off with a report still in his hands, and Dr. Gieszler, who’s wormed his way into Gottlieb’s arms and was resting his head on the other man’s lap, dead to the world and snoring loudly.

Mako retreats, smiling to herself.

She will find them tomorrow, together and whole, in the light of day.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [twitter](http://www.twitter.com/Teii) or [tumblr](http://teii.tumblr.com)! I just finished Death Stranding! If you finished it and want to talk LMK I have...FEELINGS about it. Regardless, thank you so much for reading. :)


End file.
